STACK July 2016 Issue 141

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visit DVD&BD FEATURE
34 JULY 2016
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Writer-director Jesse O’Brien puts Australia on the intergalactic map
with his impressive debut feature, Arrowhead. Words: Scott Hocking
M ention homegrown
science fiction films and
the post-apocalypse world
of Mad Max immediately springs to
mind. But when it comes to sci-fi
involving space travel, creatures and
alien worlds, Australian cinema is
severely lacking – a fact Jesse
O’Brien was determined to change.
“Genre in Australian films is
always hidden in a drama with
science fiction elements,” he notes.
“It’s very hard to find a
film that just boldly says
it’s a science fiction movie
with spaceships, space
helmets and monsters.
We wanted to make
something that was
unashamedly sci-fi, while
still being a real movie.
“We don’t just want to
make films in this genre here,” he
adds, “we want to watch them too.
So we had to make one ourselves.”
Arrowhead is set on a desert
moon, where an escaped prisoner
of war finds himself marooned and
bizarrely transforming following an
encounter with a symbiotic alien
life form.
The project was conceived as
a feature but began life as a short
film, with O’Brien’s housemate
Ryan Stevens (who was working
at JB Hi-Fi at the time, the director
reveals) serving as production
designer, composer and actor in
the short.
“We built the spaceship set
in our living room and [the short]
became a tool that we used to
try and crowdfund the feature,
which ultimately didn’t work, but
it did give us exposure that led to
funding from [cable channel] TV1,”
O’Brien explains. “I pitched to them
and they said, ‘here’s the money’,
which is the kind of thing that
never happens – it’s a dream for a
filmmaker.”
Coober Pedy in South Australia
provided the arid and otherworldly
landscape O’Brien needed for his
alien moon, and allowed him to get
the most from an $180,000 budget.
“The biggest chunk of our budget
went to accommodation in Coober
Pedy,” he says. “It was still quite
cheap and gave us everything we
needed in diversity of landscape.”
Having a fantastic location at
his disposal allowed the visual
SCI-FI
PLANET
COOBER PEDY
effects shots to be seamlessly
integrated in post-production,
using the same DIY method Gareth
Edwards applied to his first feature,
Monsters.
“That was a huge inspiration for
us,” says O’Brien of Edwards’ film.
“We’d already written Arrowhead,
but when I saw Monsters, I realised
that someone else had actually
achieved that sort of model of
filmmaking.”
O’Brien drew upon his
experience with motion
graphics in editing TV spots
and trailers to create the FX
for Arrowhead.
“DOP Samuel Baulch
[another former JB
employee!] and I did
most of the visual effects
ourselves, about 300 shots
during post-production, and we
wrote the film around what we
could do, like the simple effects
of putting planets in the sky. We
didn’t try and do too much that was
beyond our skill set.”
The result is a production
that transcends its budgetary
constraints.
Arrowhead also benefits from an
engaging central performance by
Underbelly actor Dan Mor, as well
as the inspired casting of Shaun
Micallef, who voices the crashed
shuttlecraft’s computer, REEF.
“I wanted REEF to be an
informational computer, something
that didn’t sound Australian but
a little more refined,” explains
O’Brien. “I didn’t want an Aussie
ocker voice; Shaun has a real sense
of regality to his voice.”
Arrowhead is a remarkable
achievement for a debut feature
and one that O’Brien hopes will
resonate with sci-fi fans. The film’s
universe lends itself to further
stories which he hopes can be told
in a TV series continuation, and he’s
also currently developing a new
sci-fi feature.
The rise of Australian science
fiction has begun.
The remote South
Australian opal mining
town is a ready-made
alien landscape for sci-fi
filmmakers.
RED PLANET
Add a colour filter and it's the
surface of Mars, where belligerent
stars Val Kilmer and Tom Sizemore
came to blows off-screen.
MAD MAX BEYOND
THUNDERDOME
As post-apocalyptic as Broken
Hill and the ideal location for
Bartertown – and a place where
two men enter, one man leaves.
• Arrowhead
is out now
PITCH BLACK
Not the kind of place you want to
be caught during a total eclipse,
when hungry monsters awaken.
Unless Vin Diesel is around.
COMES HOME
We don't just want to make
films in this genre here, we
want to watch them too